House of Leaves would make a terrible audiobook if that’s the kind of thing you’re looking for.

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

Edit: I’m not surprised to see that this is a popular response.

Another, different, one is The Fisherman by John Langan.

“The curious incident of the dog in the nighttime” is written in the narrative of a boy with aspergers, read it many years ago and enjoyed it a lot. Like, it really paints an interesting picture of how the world can also be experienced

Station eleven had a really unique format. You could say there were multiple main characters from different timelines but I would almost argue there was not a “main” character. All of them were super fascinating in their own right and the transitions between them, and their timelines, was incredibly smooth. I didn’t find it confusing at all and I normally do with books formatted like this.

It’s a post pandemic dystopia that focuses on the role of art in helping people find purpose if you want the shortest possible synopsis.

I never finished it, but definitely House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski. I’ll call it a “labyrinthian” horror story where both the narrative and physical formatting mirror the themes presented in the story. It’s hard to describe, but you have to at least find one in a bookstore and look through it. I don’t know if audio or digital versions exist, but I’d avoid them, you won’t get the whole experience.

Edit: Damn, took to long to write and somebody already mentioned it, lol.

In literary fiction, it’s probably As I Lay Dying. Flowers for Algernon is also a really neat concept (and a much easier, more enjoyable read).

The broken earth trilogy by NK Jemisin is written in second person, interesting style and a good read. (Fantasy, sci-fi)

Gardens of the moon by Steven Erikson, not really ‘unique’ but he does a lot of show and tell, so if you’re willing to pay attention and think a long it’s a great read. (fantasy)

Hoppscotch comes to mind. There are 2 ways to read, first is read chapters 1-56 and discard the rest. Second is follow the author’s order, which is 73, 1, 2, 116, 3, 84… At the end of each chapter it says where you should jump next. Plus there’s a lot of experimental stuff in it, steam of consciousness, news fragments, a chapter where the author made up his own language, fragments of a fictional writer, etc

Only thing is I don’t know how well the original Spanish translates to other languages (tho according to Wikipedia the English translator won some award so should be good).

Lockpick Pornography by Joey Comeau. I’d never read a book from the POV of a genderqueer character before.

Feersum Endjinn

Gnomon by Nick Harkaway is one of my favorite weird books. On its surface, it’s about a detective digging into a wrongful death at the hands of a state interrogator… but as it progresses, you realize things are not quite what they seem.

A few I haven’t seen mentioned in the thread yet:

• Ducks, Newburyport - Lucy Ellman. It’s one sentence long, although it occupies 1,000 pages. It’s well though done that it doesn’t just feel like a creative writing exercise. It’s not necessarily something I’d recommend, but it’s surprisingly ok.
• If on a winter’s night a traveler - Italo Calvino. It’s about the reader (you) trying to read a book called “If on a winter’s night a traveler” It’s funny, and short enough to not push the bit too far. Every time you think you’re onto its trick, it finds a new one.
• Ulysses - James Joyce. A loose reframing of the Odyssey with the stakes massively lowered. Different chapters have different writing styles. Other works borrow ideas from this, so any individual attempt at innovation may be something you’ve seen elsewhere. For example, the single sentence stream of consciousness of Ducks, Newburyport was likely inspired by the 3 sentence closing chapter here. The book is kind of a lot. If you were to read it, it’s worth at least considering if you want to use a guide. The Joyce Project has a good wiki-style guide embedded in the text.

Iain M. Banks Feersum Endjin one of the characters narrates the story phonetically.

Alan Duff Once Were Warriors and sequels. Entirely written as interior monologues.

If you can find it, Gooberz by Linda Goodman is a pretty wild read. It’s a poetic semi-autobiography with an overarching theme of love and grief.

It’s also printed in a fairly bold style in the original hardback.

I can’t think of anything I’ve read that stands out as much in terms of never having run across anything quite like it. People just don’t write 1000+ page stories in rhymed meter for one thing. Doing so with a blend of autobiography and fiction, weaving in bits of mysticism and philosophy (rather woowoo in that regard, the author was a professional astrologer, but don’t let that sour you on the book itself) and managing to tell a heart wrenching story.

Is it something everyone will like? Absolutely not. I did. I recently acquired a first edition of it and plan a re-read soon (the book is fucking thick though, so it isn’t a casual read with my arthritis nowadays). It weren’t cheap, though also not beyond my reach either, so I obviously think it worth the effort of wrestling my attention span for.

I do, however, suggest that one get a digital version and just look up pictures of the printed version lol.

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine was a book that threw me just because the main protagonist had such odd perspectives.

Listen For the Lie by Amy Tintera is written with segments of it like a true crime podcast. Highly recommend it as a listen.

Ive been reading a lot of books that aren’t written traditionally. Taylor Jenkins Reid books, Evelyn Hugo was written as an interview, Daisy Jones and the Six like documentary, etc. Dungeon Crawler Carl is LitRPG and best as audiobook (written primarily as such). Of Monsters and Mainframes was written with computers as main characters. Super fun.

So many good books out there. Please report back on what you’ve enjoyed the most!